Easter

We've had a great Easter. This year the kids wanted something a little more challenging so we decided on a scavenger hunt. For lunch, our good friends Tim, Diane, Tyler and Gunnar came over for Easter lunch.....lots of ham, potato salad and stuff to eat!

This was their baskets before the hunt.

Reviewing their list of items to find

After finding all the loot!

Not only did Chuck and I make a scavenger hunt for the kids, the kids sent us geocaching around the house. It was very cleaver! Here are the clues Kinzi and Nathan came up with!

For Easter, we've hidden a cache for you too! On the back will be your first clue!

Look near the crack that does not creak, but sprang a leak! **kids bathroom unknown crack until that day....some water from the bathroom had escaped down the wall and soak the drywall downstairs and we now have peeling paint.....an egg was placed there with further clues**

Now your here, do you look up, down, or turn around. Now look in what you've found! (Beware of decoys). **Little box with magnet on inside and outside put high upon a wall....had to get a step stool to get to it.....it had another clue in it**

From the pong to the ping, your sure to find this thing! **Magnetic egg under ping pong table with clues to last clue from the kids!**

Where the stench rays dwell, from the socks to the smell, where's this cache? We won't tell! ** This ended up being Nathan's sock drawer with a big egg that looks much like all the caches we find when we are geocaching.....I must say it had us going for a while....we always say the dog has stench rays so we were focused on him for a while....but we finally figured it out!

We were so please that the kids thought about doing that for us! Now here our clues for the kids....I won't put all 30 but I'll put the really good ones:

1) I'm hiding next to one of your favorite possessions. I like the dark, but a little light and wind is present when things "compute". ....The computer

2) You don't use me very much, but I do the dirty work after meals.....dishwasher

3) I like to "hang" out with the food. Mom likes me because I can be very "spicy". .....Spice Rack

4) Mom loves to listen to me. Dad hates to clean me. Bees love me......The fountain outside

5) If I was a snake charmer, I would look for the right of 3......I have 3 little baskets that look like snake charming baskets..

6) I'm hiding with the dust bunnies...If you find me, this challenge will be "wrapped up"....under mom's bed by the wrapping paper

7) You'll soom become familiar with me. "Gas" me up and let the "clippings" fly.......the lawn mower

8)Don't let me "bounce" to high!......the trampoline

9) Wiiiii, you found miiiiiiiii!......obviously by the Wii

10) We wish the dog did his chores......Scruffy's toy box

Spring Break

Not much happening on the Blank home front. It is Spring Break for Nathan and Mackinzi. Nathan goes back to school on Monday while Mackinzi has another week. My sister, Brendi, and her son, Matthew, drove down from Slaton, TX and spent a few days with us. We had a good time. It's much harder to entertain guest in Tucson than it was in Las Vegas!


Nathan had his bottom braces put on this week. He's not a happy camper!

Bar after color enhancing and sealing the slate

We are no longer Muggles!!!!!

We've found a new family activity. It's called Geocaching. What is geocaching you ask?

From the Geocaching website: Geocaching is an entertaining adventure game for gps users. Participating in a cache hunt is a good way to take advantage of the wonderful features and capability of a gps unit. The basic idea is to have individuals and organizations set up caches all over the world and share the locations of these caches on the internet. GPS users can then use the location coordinates to find the caches. Once found, a cache may provide the visitor with a wide variety of rewards. All the visitor is asked to do is if they get something they should try to leave something for the cache.

If you've read the Harry Potter books and/or seen the movie you know that muggles are non-practitoners or people who don't know what you're talking about. When you search for a cache...most of them say "Beware of Muggles" if the cache is located in a public place so non-geocachers don't disturb the cache and others can enjoy it and play along. We were muggles before because we didn't even know they existed....and boy are they everywhere. They are even hidden in Clovis, NM and Slaton, Tx.

We've found geocachers signature items that they want to track. We log that we have it and where we are going to move it to. We've found a travel bug...again a trackable item. Chuck is taking a toy Thunderbird airplane to the Thunderbirds squadron while he is in Las Vegas and getting a picture made with it and a real Thunderbird airplane. This is someone travel bug and they wanted it to go to the "Thunderbird base".

If your interested in geocaching, all you need is a GPS and signup at www.geocaching.com.

We just started...these first two pictures are of the kids looking for a location around Sahuarita Lake, finding it and then opening it.

We found this cache.....

Hiding like this.....

At the base of this giant saguaro.

Bar in progress

This is a picture of our "work in progress" bar. They installed the tile today....isn't it gorgeous. We will post pictures when complete!

Wrestling Tournaments and Sock Hops

Wow! We have been busy lately! First of all, Nathan had two wrestling meets this week. The first was on Tuesday and he wrestled five times. The first four times he lost but fought like crazy and then he got his first pin of the season! WooHoo! Today (and yesterday) was a huge tournament here. Nathan wrestled 5 times. He lost a few...he won a few (got 2 new pins) and earned his way to 3rd place and earned an individual medal! While wrestling, he made a new friend, Lance. Lance got 4th in the tournament! Here are the fabulous pictures!

Mackinzi was also a busy girl this weekend. The 3rd annual Daddy/Daughter dinner was held by Mackinzi's school. This year the theme was a sock hop. She told me at the last minute she wanted a poodle skirt so the day before the sock hop we produced the skirt. I think it turned out great! Mackinzi looks forward to the event every year! Chuck said they both had a great time!

Let me catch you up on other things. Nathan did get all 4 teeth pulled. The second one was almost as hard as the first one. It broke off at the roots and the dentist had to dig out the roots....doesn't that sound lovely. The bottom two were much easier, so much so that when the dentist pulled one of the bottom teeth out he pulled much harder than he had to and it went sailing across the room and the assistant caught it! Nathan thought that was hysterical!

Mackinzi won her soccer game last weekend. She had a fabulous game...2 assists and almost scored on her own. She played keeper really well too!

Both mid-term progress reports look fabulous so we are expecting really good grades again!

All 4 of us were sick two weeks ago but we are feeling much better now.

Scruffy had another seizure this week....poor puppy. It breaks our heart that he has seizure ever so often. Three out of the four seizures he's had is when someone unexpected knocks on the door super loud and he get aggitated and then all the sudden he having seizures. He doesn't have one, he has 3 or 4 in a row! It's always scary.

As always, it crazy busy! This week is not any better. Nathan has another wrestling meet on Tuesday, and Chuck has surgery on Wednesday. We have dentist appointments galore and we'll start delivering our girl scout cookies!

Better go and get my beauty sleep!

2006/2007 Family Scrapbook Pages

I just finished our 2006 and 2007 family scrapbook pages. Since 2006 turned out so well, I wanted to post those too! 2006 are the first three in turquoise and black and 2007 are the last four in brown/blues and oranges.

Credits: 2006 Pictures: Bewitching Kit by Krista; Templates 190, 118 and 168 by Andrea Gold
Credits: 2007 Pictures: Cherish and Knocking on Wood Kits by Weeds and Wildflowers; Templates d01, 104 and 147 by Andrea Gold